Background

Notes and format last updated May 7, 2020

Starting on the May 7th update, the NY Times began including probable covid cases/deaths along with confirmed. This mostly affects death counts – for certain geographies that include probable COVID deaths in addition to confirmed, these are now added to the totals. For the time being, they were all added to the May 6th totals, causing a big spike at the U.S. level. Over time, NY Times will revise their historical counts and distribute these added deaths when they actually occurred, so the spike should fade.

Growth rates

Heat maps

  • The two heat maps below compare how quickly total cases or deaths have grown at various times in our respective geopgraphies.
  • The first plot compares growth rate for total cases; the second, growth rate for total deaths.
  • The metric used is doubling time, by which I mean how quickly total cases or deaths are doubling.
  • The plots track that doubling time at each date for our geographies. Darker colors reflect shorter doubling times, and thus periods of faster growth.
    • You can use the plots to track each geography over time and to compare the geographies to one another.
    • You can also compare the cases and death charts, to see how faster periods of death growth follow faster periods of case growth.

Case growth rates

  • This section charts the growth rate of both total and new cases for each of our respective geographies. Each geography has its own chart, and then that chart will have a trendline for total cases and new cases.
    • There are only plots for the U.S. and states because the numbers for the counties are too small to generate worthwhile trendlines in this section.
  • Note that we’re charting growth rate and not a count of cases, so don’t think of these as the standard “curve” that we hear about in the news and that we want to flatten. Instead, these growth rate charts help track more precisely what we can only estimate when we see those other curves. For these growth rate charts, if the line is above zero, the metric we are tracking (total or new cases) is continuing to grow. If the growth rate line is going up, it’s growing more quickly each day; if it’s going down but still above zero, it’s growing less quickly (but still growing). Only when the growth rate lines go below zero has the metric stopped growing.
  • Each of these two lines uses rolling windows to calculate a growth rate for that particular metric. I do the calculation differently for each to smooth out some of the large day-to-day discrepancies in new case reporting at the state level.
    • For total cases, the trendlines are a rolling 3-day average of daily growth rates in total cases. We want to see these decline (and almost all are), but they can’t go below zero. This is because we’re tracking growth rate and a growth rate line below zero would mean total cases have gone down, which can’t happen. They can only grow less quickly, which means we want to see the total case line get as close to zero as possible.
    • For new cases, the trendlines show a rolling 3-day average of daily growth rate in the rolling 7-day average of new cases. Including two rolling periods in this average helps smooth out crazy spikes at the state level that result from large day-to-day changes. Unlike the lines for total cases, we want to watch for the lines for new cases to get consistently below zero and stay there. That means that we are consistently seeing fewer new cases on a daily basis.

U.S.

Our states

Death growth rates

  • This section charts the growth rate of both total and new deaths for each of our respective geographies. Each geography has its own chart, and then that chart will have a trendline for total deaths and new deaths.
    • There are only plots for the U.S. and states because the numbers for the counties are too small to generate worthwhile trendlines in this section.
  • Note that we’re charting growth rate and not a count of deaths, so don’t think of these as the standard “curve” that we hear about in the news and that we want to flatten. Instead, these growth rate charts help track more precisely what we can only estimate when we see those other curves. For these growth rate charts, if the line is above zero, the metric we are tracking (total or new deaths) is continuing to grow. If the growth rate line is going up, it’s growing more quickly each day; if it’s going down but still above zero, it’s growing less quickly (but still growing). Only when the growth rate lines go below zero has the metric stopped growing.
  • Each of these two lines uses rolling windows to calculate a growth rate for that particular metric. I do the calculation differently for each to smooth out some of the large day-to-day discrepancies in new death reporting at the state level.
    • For total deaths, the trendlines are a rolling 3-day average of daily growth rates in total deaths. We want to see these decline (and almost all are), but they can’t go below zero. This is because we’re tracking growth rate and a growth rate line below zero would mean total deaths have gone down, which can’t happen. They can only grow less quickly, which means we want to see the total death line get as close to zero as possible.
    • For new deaths, the trendlines show a rolling 3-day average of daily growth rate in the rolling 7-day average of new deaths. Including two rolling periods in this average helps smooth out crazy spikes at the state level that result from large day-to-day changes. Unlike the lines for total deaths, we want to watch for the lines for new deaths to get consistently below zero and stay there. That means that we are consistently seeing fewer new deaths on a daily basis.

U.S.

Our states

By population rankings

This section tracks metrics for states and counties normalized for population (number of cases or deaths per million residents), and then compares these figures both for our geographies and the country overall.

States

  • This section shows tables ranking all 50 states for per populations rates of total cases, new cases, total deaths, and new deaths.
  • For each metric, in addition to the tables, the trends for the top states are plotted over time.
    • We only plot the top ten states for each metric so that the plots aren’t too crowded. But you can view the full 50-state rankings in the tables.

Total confirmed cases

Table of total confirmed cases per million residents (all 50 states)
Ranking State Cases Per Million
1 North Dakota 137,490
2 South Dakota 135,312
3 Rhode Island 133,190
4 Utah 121,699
5 Tennessee 118,324
6 Arizona 116,718
7 Iowa 113,157
8 Oklahoma 111,905
9 Wisconsin 110,897
10 Nebraska 110,795
11 Arkansas 110,064
12 South Carolina 109,287
13 New Jersey 107,348
14 Alabama 105,828
15 Kansas 105,212
16 Indiana 104,272
17 Mississippi 103,304
18 Idaho 102,546
19 Illinois 101,256
20 Delaware 101,225
21 New York 100,485
22 Nevada 100,004
23 Montana 99,394
24 Florida 98,903
25 Georgia 98,890
26 Wyoming 98,267
27 Kentucky 97,678
28 Texas 97,502
29 Louisiana 96,549
30 Missouri 96,453
31 Minnesota 96,128
32 Massachusetts 95,693
33 California 93,658
34 New Mexico 92,219
35 Connecticut 90,199
36 North Carolina 89,173
37 Ohio 88,925
38 Alaska 87,840
39 Pennsylvania 84,148
40 Colorado 83,582
41 Michigan 82,105
42 West Virginia 81,560
43 Virginia 74,459
44 Maryland 70,615
45 New Hampshire 65,347
46 District of Columbia 64,938
47 Washington 49,646
48 Puerto Rico 46,627
49 Oregon 40,440
50 Maine 40,142
51 Vermont 33,978
52 Hawaii 21,926

New confirmed cases

Table of new cases per million residents: rolling 3-day average (all 50 states)
Ranking State New Cases Per Million
1 Michigan 541
2 New Jersey 419
3 Minnesota 406
4 Delaware 399
5 New York 388
6 Puerto Rico 369
7 New Hampshire 346
8 Pennsylvania 330
9 Massachusetts 319
10 Florida 303
11 Vermont 284
12 Colorado 272
13 Maryland 270
14 Illinois 267
15 West Virginia 250
16 Maine 239
17 South Carolina 200
18 South Dakota 191
19 Indiana 190
20 Nevada 184
21 Rhode Island 177
22 Virginia 174
23 Connecticut 168
24 North Dakota 166
25 Ohio 166
26 Iowa 165
27 District of Columbia 156
28 Wisconsin 156
29 Nebraska 153
30 Oregon 140
31 Georgia 126
32 Utah 124
33 Arizona 121
34 Washington 116
35 Alaska 112
36 Kentucky 111
37 Montana 108
38 Missouri 100
39 California 88
40 Hawaii 87
41 Texas 81
42 North Carolina 75
43 Alabama 66
44 Mississippi 66
45 Tennessee 63
46 Idaho 57
47 Louisiana 52
48 Arkansas 49
49 Kansas 47
50 Wyoming 40
51 Oklahoma 35
52 New Mexico 19

Total deaths

Table of total deaths per million residents (all 50 states)
Ranking State Deaths Per Million
1 New Jersey 2,799
2 New York 2,601
3 Massachusetts 2,522
4 Rhode Island 2,490
5 Mississippi 2,384
6 Arizona 2,347
7 Connecticut 2,228
8 South Dakota 2,199
9 Louisiana 2,197
10 Alabama 2,184
11 Pennsylvania 1,988
12 North Dakota 1,970
13 Indiana 1,952
14 New Mexico 1,897
15 Illinois 1,877
16 Arkansas 1,875
17 Iowa 1,856
18 South Carolina 1,801
19 Georgia 1,778
20 Michigan 1,757
21 Tennessee 1,742
22 Nevada 1,731
23 Texas 1,702
24 Kansas 1,694
25 Oklahoma 1,685
26 Delaware 1,620
27 Ohio 1,610
28 Florida 1,583
29 District of Columbia 1,531
30 West Virginia 1,531
31 California 1,529
32 Missouri 1,467
33 Montana 1,424
34 Kentucky 1,421
35 Maryland 1,398
36 Wisconsin 1,267
37 Minnesota 1,247
38 Virginia 1,226
39 Wyoming 1,211
40 Nebraska 1,204
41 North Carolina 1,170
42 Idaho 1,116
43 Colorado 1,078
44 New Hampshire 924
45 Washington 705
46 Puerto Rico 674
47 Utah 673
48 Oregon 581
49 Maine 557
50 Alaska 408
51 Vermont 370
52 Hawaii 330

New deaths

Table of new deaths per million residents: rolling 3-day average (all 50 states)
Ranking State New Deaths Per Million
1 Montana 8
2 Delaware 3
3 Georgia 3
4 Michigan 3
5 Nebraska 3
6 New Jersey 3
7 New York 3
8 Alabama 2
9 California 2
10 Kentucky 2
11 Maryland 2
12 Minnesota 2
13 Nevada 2
14 Ohio 2
15 Pennsylvania 2
16 South Carolina 2
17 South Dakota 2
18 Texas 2
19 Arizona 1
20 District of Columbia 1
21 Florida 1
22 Illinois 1
23 Indiana 1
24 Iowa 1
25 Louisiana 1
26 Massachusetts 1
27 Mississippi 1
28 New Hampshire 1
29 North Dakota 1
30 Utah 1
31 Virginia 1
32 West Virginia 1
33 Alaska 0
34 Arkansas 0
35 Colorado 0
36 Connecticut 0
37 Hawaii 0
38 Idaho 0
39 Kansas 0
40 Maine 0
41 Missouri 0
42 New Mexico 0
43 North Carolina 0
44 Oklahoma 0
45 Oregon 0
46 Puerto Rico 0
47 Rhode Island 0
48 Tennessee 0
49 Vermont 0
50 Washington 0
51 Wisconsin 0
52 Wyoming 0

Counties

  • This section focuses on the county level. It shows tables with our counties ranked by percentile of U.S. counties for per population rates of total cases and total deaths.
    • Each table also shows the top five counties in the country in addition to our counties, for added perspecive.
  • In addition to the tables, our counties’ percentile for both total cases and total deaths are plotted over time.

Confirmed cases

Table showing total cases per million and percentile for all US counties. Includes our counties and the top 5 in the US for perspective.
County State Cases Per Million Raw Ranking Percentile
Crowley Colorado 355,222 1 99
Chattahoochee Georgia 341,340 2 99
Bent Colorado 266,631 3 99
Dewey South Dakota 244,908 4 99
Lincoln Arkansas 244,702 5 99
Davidson Tennessee 137,797 194 93
Richland South Carolina 107,428 1013 67
York South Carolina 104,342 1150 63
Orange California 84,446 2081 33
Pierce Washington 49,234 2896 7

Our county percentiles over time

Deaths

Table showing total deaths per million and percentile for all US counties. Includes our counties and the top 5 in the US for perspective.
County State Deaths Per Million Raw Ranking Percentile
Foard Texas 8,658 1 99
Gove Kansas 8,346 2 99
Jerauld South Dakota 7,948 3 99
Galax city Virginia 7,878 4 99
Emporia city Virginia 7,856 5 99
Orange California 1,524 1780 43
Davidson Tennessee 1,322 2029 35
York South Carolina 1,313 2038 35
Richland South Carolina 1,287 2070 34
Pierce Washington 686 2726 13

Our county percentiles over time

Raw counts

Total confirmed cases

U.S.

Our states

Our counties

New confirmed cases

U.S.

Our states

Our counties

Total deaths

U.S.

Our states

Our counties

New deaths

U.S.

Our states

Our counties

Stay-at-home comparisons